president obama is selling his economic agenda and using all the right tools. the president was surrounded today by middle class taxpayers at the white house as he pushed for an extension of the tax cuts for income below $250,000. he quas quick to highlight the break in the ranks with the republicans. >> i am glad to see, if you've been reading the papers lately, that more and more republicans in congress, seem to be agreeing with this idea that we should have a balanced approach. so if both parties agree we should not raise taxes on middle class families, let's begin our work with where we agree. >> president obama isn't talking about some moderate republican or some blue dog democrat, he is talking about conservative republican oklahoma congressman, tom cole. cole is the first republican to openly call for agreeing to middle class tax cuts. >> we all agree that we are not going to raise taxes on people that make less than $250,000. we should just take them out of this discussion right now. continue to fight against any rate increases, continue to try to work